MechE Student Payroll Information

In order to be set up as a student employee in Mechanical Engineering, you must submit the following form to the Financial Administrator (mechefin@bu.edu, 110 Cummington Mall, Room 116A) before you start working. Please note that your immediate supervisor must also approve your hire before you can start.

1. Complete the Student Hire Form

2. After receiving the completed form, the MechE department will initiate a hire in JobX.
3. An email notification will direct you to your JobX dashboard, where you can access and complete the required online hiring forms. All forms must be completed before beginning any work at BU and for the hire to be fully processed. Only the Student Hire Form will be needed if you’ve already completed the online forms for previous BU employment.

Online Hiring Forms:

• Form I-9
• FERPA Waiver
• Student Confidentiality Policy
• *International Student Form (required only for international students)
• *Union FERPA Waiver (required for all BUGWU hires)

Filling out the I-9

Students must complete the mandatory Form I-9 once their hire has been initiated in JobX within three days of the start of their position. After completing Section 1 online, the student must either visit FirstPoint, Student Employment Office (SEO), 881 Commonwealth Avenue, or coordinate with the department administrator to complete Section 2, as supervisors do not receive alerts from the Form I-9 compliance system.

All students, including international students, must complete a Form I-9 prior to beginning work. The process is the same for all students: Section 1 is completed online, and Section 2 must be completed in person. Students with F-1 visas may complete Section 2 with a department administrator or at FirstPoint. Students with J-1 visas must complete Section 2 with ISSO.

Document(s) must be original and unexpired. Copies of IDs are not accepted (this a requirement of the USCIS). Acceptable documents are listed here. You must bring one document from List A OR a document from List B AND List C to the MechE front office or SEO.

Paychecks/ Setting up Direct Deposit

Students can receive their first paycheck via direct deposit as long as they enter their direct deposit information within their first week of work. Students will need to set up their direct deposit through the Employee Self-Service tab in the BU Works Central Portal. Please note that you will not have access to BU Works until your start date and you’ve received confirmation that you’ve been hired.

Students will have access to the Employee Self Service pages as early as their first date of employment. If you do not have the Employee Self-Service tab in BUWorks Central Portal by or after that date, please submit a service ticket for additional assistance.

Even if you already have direct deposit from working at BU previously, you should verify that you have authorized direct deposit for any new student employment position. You must resubmit authorization any time you are hired into a new position.

Students who do not have direct deposit authorized will receive a physical check mailed from the University’s banking partner to your address listed in the BUWorks Employee Self-Service system. For more information about paychecks, please click here.

Directions for setting up direct deposit.

Submitting Electronic Time Sheets

If you’re paid hourly, it’s your responsibility to submit an online timesheet every week that you work. Additionally, please verify with your supervisor your estimated weekly hours at the start of your job and request approval if you expect to exceed these hours on any given week. If you have more than one job, you must split your hours to make sure you are not exceeding more than 20 hours in a work week while classes are in session.

The work week starts on Monday and ends on Sundays. Hours in timesheets are entered in a 24-hour military time format and should be entered in 15-minute increments.  Timesheets must accurately reflect only the hours worked. Lunch time, breaks, sick days, holidays, emergency closures, and snow days are not to be counted as hours worked. An unpaid break is required after working six consecutive hours.

Plan to submit and also release any hours worked on Fridays if possible, or by Sunday night at 11:59 PM so that they can be approved in time.  No time entry is allowed while payroll runs from Tuesday afternoon through Wednesday.  Please look out for early holiday timesheet deadlines, which can be found on SEO’s website and are often announced via e-mail.

Timely Submission of Timesheets is Important!

If you forget to submit your timesheet or miss the payroll deadline, you can submit back hours online for the week worked. It is best practice to inform the payroll coordinator so that these hours can be approved. These hours will be paid out in the next pay cycle. Please be aware that late payments create the potential to be placed in a higher tax bracket, which may cause more taxes to be withheld for the week in which you are receiving additional payments.

Please find instructions for timesheet submission here.

Forms W-4 and M4

The federal W-4 and state M-4 forms mandate how much in taxes BU Payroll should withhold from your paycheck. While you’re not required to complete these forms, they can help ensure you’re not overpaying—or underpaying—your taxes throughout the year. If you do not submit a W-4, the university will default to withholding the maximum amount at your income bracket: single with zero dependencies.

Domestic students working on-campus positions can update their W-4 and M-4 tax withholding certificates through the BUworks Central Portal. Please find more information here.

International F-1 students: Please review the tax information for international students on SEO’s website, found here, for more instructions on the W-4 and if it is applicable to you.

*Please note, BU administrators are not qualified to give students tax advice. Consult your parents or guardians for advice or seek out tax guidance from a professional. For free tax help, contact the Internal Revenue Service or Massachusetts Department of Revenue.

BUGWU/Graduate Student Stipends

Graduate students paid on a weekly salary do not need to submit weekly timesheets. Most first year Phd students also known as graduate fellows are paid via a weekly non-service stipend during the academic year. In the spring semester, the MechE department will initiate the hiring process into JobX for Phd students who are joining faculty labs in the summer semester at which time their payments will become service stipends. Students will need to complete the online hiring forms as outlined previously. Our office will contact any student if any additional information is needed. Master’s level students working less than 20 hours per week must be hired into hourly positions, and will need to submit weekly timesheets.

Please find detailed information about BUGWU and Non-Service and Service Stipend FAQs

Other Information

The Student Employment Office website has many resources available to students, including information on requesting duplicate W-2s, tax treaty lists, and understanding your pay stub.